Few cases of such true royal martyrdom exist as that of Britain's King Charles I of the House of Stuart. Over the years, a great deal of 'bad press' has been heaped on the king, who was actually declared a saint by the Anglican Church, though Queen Victoria took his feast day off the church calendar. We are told that in spite of his good points, Charles was simply a bad king. However, the facts show that from early in his reign up until the present, he has been guilty of nothing more than being the victim of biased persons with loud voices. He believed in the Divine Right of Kings, which makes him unpopular today; he was a Scotsman, which made him unpopular with many Englishmen, just as his father before him; he was a High Anglican which upset the Puritans as did the fact that he married a devout Catholic. Many suspected that Charles himself was a "closet Catholic" which was almost criminal at the time.
Much is made of the fact that King Charles called three Parliaments after becoming king in 1625, and dissolved each of them. What was at the heart of Charles' problems with the political establishment was his unwillingness to compromise his principles. From 1629-1640 the king ruled by decree without a Parliament and fought a war in Scotland over preserving the episcopacy. He was an extremely religious man who fought to keep Catholic traditions and reverence in Church of England services. None of these things were beyond the legal powers of the king and no monarch before him had ever been treated in such a way for using their lawful powers to rule as he or she saw fit. Nevertheless, in 1642 when Charles tried to arrest several members of Parliament for treason, civil war broke out between the Royalists and Parliamentarians.
Throughout the conflict King Charles fought bravely and surprised many with his ability as a general. His outnumbered but skillful army won many early victories over the rebel forces. Eventually though, the wealth of the Puritan merchants that made up a large number of his enemies, began to tell. After the battle of Naseby in 1645 the war was effectively over. King Charles was taken by the Scots and turned over to the rebels. In 1649 Charles was taken to London to stand trial for his "treason" against the people of England. Such a charge sounds absurd and many recognized it and numerous people among the king's own enemies boycotted the trial because they believed it to be an unjust act of revenge and a deliberate effort to take public attention off more pressing matters.
The rebel army occupied London and would not allow those members of Parliament they believed sympathetic to the king to take their seats. Charles refused to recognize the right of this "rump" of his enemies to try him and refused to enter a plea. When he did speak on his own behalf he was the picture of bravery, piety and integrity and when he began to make too good an argument the court had him removed from the chamber. He requested to be heard before a full Parliament, but this was denied him. In fact, the Parliament had already stated that the King of England could not be legally deposed. Despite the obvious injustice of the "trial" and the fact that it was all done according to the power of the sword and not the rule of law, Charles I was declared guilty and sentanced to death by beheading. He met his death bravely saying, "I go from a corruptible to an incorruptible crown, where no disturbance can be". England became a dictatorship under Oliver Cromwell after his death, and little more than a decade later his son was restored as King Charles II. |
